Thinking, about cycling. "Anybody whose mind is proud enough not to breed true secretly carries a bomb at the back of his brain; and so I suggest, just for the fun of the thing, taking that private bomb and carefully dropping it upon the model city of commonsense." (This blog began as an archive of DYNAMITE!, the newsletter of London Dynamo cycling club, which you can still access via "DYNAMITE! filed" in the list below on the left.)

Posts Tagged ‘street art’

Can you recall, as a child, plunging into a picture book and immersing yourself in a strange new land? I got a similar kick this week after issue 20 of VNA magazine popped through our letterbox as part of Jen’s mailout from Stack, the ever-dependable independent magazine subscription service. VNA (which stands for Very Nearly Almost) is about street art, a distant, magical and sometimes nightmarish world of which I know nothing, save for a brief visit to the paint-strewn streets of Brussels a few weeks ago which you may or may not remember me gabbing on about.

What I like about VNA is that it is packed with lots of interesting, amazing stuff I had never seen before – which is what we all want from a magazine, right? – and the writing is engaging and focused, placing a varied collection of artists in their own particular artistic context. My favourites were Guy McKinley’s ornate, fantasy-inspired portraits and the imposing symbols of cover star Retna, who Jen informs me is apparently quite famous. There is also a painting of a child’s face seemingly embedded in a wall in Granada that caught my eye.

VNA is in a nice compact format and it only costs six quid, which isn’t bad for an indie mag. So why not give it a go? I’m sure you’ll find something you’ll like in it, and I can’t say that about many magazines.

Another new visitor to our magazine rack is a new publication simply entitled Cyclist.

Essentially, it’s adapted the Cycling Plus format of clear, informed product reviews, added a dash of pro peloton features and delivered it in a stylish, upmarket package with a not unreasonable £5 cover price. Some of the photography and their feature on the Colnago factory are reminiscent of Rouleur (interestingly, Rouleur’s publisher used to be a suit at Dennis, which publishes Cyclist, and both magazines are advertising in each other’s pages).

I think what may set Cyclist apart from other cycling mags is that it feels more current – issue one included a neat spread on the trend for all things fluoro, a feature on electronic shifting and a look at disc brakes as part of the Colnago piece. More importantly, it is packed with facts, which makes it sound a bit dull, but I think clearly presented information is what cyclists value above all else in a magazine.

The writing may need to be warmer, and it will be interesting to see how it develops its own voice. The only thing I really didn’t like was a column by Velominati rule bore Frank Strack, but that’s a long post for another day. Overall, I think Cyclist has made a solid start, and you shouldn’t ask for anything more from a new magazine. Issue two is out this week. I bought my copy at Pearson Performance, so maybe you’ll find it at your local bike shop too.